Most personal computers and many other types of computing devices such as game consoles, TV set-top boxes, industrial control equipment, and automotive equipment are designed to connect to different peripheral devices that expand the functionality of the computing device. Peripheral devices and computing devices typically employ communication standards that enable the host device to recognize the presence and identity of a connected peripheral device. These communication standards facilitate plug-and-play, which enables a computing device to automatically recognize a peripheral device and assign all of the resources that it requires without manual intervention. While older legacy personal computer peripheral devices and earlier versions of computer operating systems did not implement the convenience of plug-and-play, most peripheral devices currently sold for use with personal computers are plug-and-play compatible. In addition, newer personal computers and newer operating systems now being sold and many newer designs of peripheral devices provide for “hot” connection or disconnection of a Universal Serial Bus (USB) peripheral device while the computer is energized. For example, many computers and peripheral devices support the USB standard and have USB interfaces which provide for “hot” connection or disconnection. Specifically, when a newly connected USB device is enumerated by the operating system, a vendor identification (ID), a product ID, and other information are obtained from the peripheral device in device descriptor fields. Assuming that a USB-compliant peripheral device was previously installed on the computer (i.e., listed in a device registry and provided with an appropriate device driver), the computer can immediately begin using the peripheral device.
Currently, when a peripheral device is connected to a computer or other host device for the very first time, it is at times necessary to run a setup program to install any client application software used in connection with the peripheral device and to provide a driver for the peripheral device. Typically, a peripheral device driver and related application software are provided on a CD-ROM or floppy disk that is packaged with the peripheral device. Drivers for peripheral devices are not always provided with the operating system, particularly for peripheral devices sold after the operating system was released for sale. When a driver is not included with the operating system, a user must manually load or otherwise manually provide the driver, application software, and/or other material for the peripheral device. The interaction required by the user to initially install a peripheral device thus detracts from a quality user experience, because the initial installation of the peripheral device is not truly a “plug-and-play” operation.
Typically, when a new peripheral device is connected to a computer, the computer operating system detects the presence of the new peripheral, and then requests the user to insert the CD-ROM or other medium supplied with the peripheral device. Users are accustomed to this delay incurred before using a new product, but would clearly prefer to avoid it. Similarly, manufacturers of peripheral devices would prefer not to include CD-ROMs or floppy disks with their products, because of the costs involved. Producing and distributing CD-ROMs or other memory media shipped with a peripheral device represents a considerable expense to peripheral vendors for at least two reasons. One reason is the obvious cost of materials and packaging associated with providing tangible medium, such as CD-ROMs. In addition, scheduling production of CD-ROMs or floppy disks can delay shipment of the peripheral devices, or reduce the amount of software development time available. If changes to the device driver or other software that will be shipped with a new peripheral device are required late in the development cycle of the product, then CD-ROM production may be delayed until after hardware production of the peripheral is already complete. Besides delaying delivery of the peripheral devices, storing the completed peripheral devices in inventory while the CD-ROMs or floppy disks are being produced adds cost and delays revenue generation. Alternatively, to ensure CD-ROM and/or floppy disk production meets the expected peripheral hardware production and shipping schedules, software development may be cut short and development of additional features that might make the overall peripheral product more competitive and attractive in the marketplace may not occur. Vendors may even have to distribute updated software on another CD-ROM, or by other means, to correct bugs in the software or improve the functionality of software materials previously shipped with peripheral devices sold.
Updated device drivers and other materials are often available via the Internet, and many computers have either full-time connections or at least a dialup connection to the Internet. Thus, a peripheral vendor doesn't necessarily have to supply a CD-ROM or floppy disks with a peripheral device if a vendor instead requires users to obtain the materials by a download over the Internet. However, connecting to the Internet and/or downloading drivers and other materials is also a manual process that must be carried out by the user, and will normally require the user to enter an appropriate address for a manufacturer web site, and then search through various web pages until the appropriate web page is found to enable the download to occur. Such a manual process can be difficult for novice users, can delay the initial installation of a peripheral on a computer, and likely detracts from user satisfaction. Furthermore, a frequent problem with peripheral devices being reinstalled on a host computing device is that the user will have misplaced the CD-ROMs or floppy disks that were originally provided with the peripheral devices. Unless device drivers can be obtained from another source, it may not be possible to reinstall a peripheral device.
A novel alternative addressing these problems is for the peripheral manufacturer to provide a network address in a memory of the peripheral device for a site from which a device driver and/or other information pertinent to the peripheral device can be obtained. This alternative is disclosed in commonly assigned U.S. patent application, entitled “Method and System to Access Software Pertinent to an Electronic Peripheral Device Based on an Address Stored in a Peripheral Device,” Ser. No. 09/760,327, filed on Jan. 12, 2001. In this alternative, the operating system reads the address from the peripheral device when the peripheral device is first connected to a host computing device, or when the host computing device is energized with the peripheral device connected to the host computing device for the first time. The operating system then automatically downloads the driver and/or other material from a web server or remote device accessed using the Internet address. However, this approach requires that the peripheral device store an address. Since peripheral devices currently do not store such a network address, existing or legacy peripheral devices could not utilize this novel alternative.
It would thus be desirable to provide another method applicable to existing peripheral devices, for automatically providing a network address for a site from which materials pertaining to a peripheral device that is connected to a host computing device can be obtained. Currently, there is no provision for accomplishing this function. The method should also avoid the need for substantial user manual interaction to load device drivers and install related software when connecting a peripheral device to a host computing device. Clearly, a system and method providing automated access over a network to the required drivers and other related software, for both new and older peripheral devices, will avoid the problems noted above.